


Through your blue eyes

by cellardoors_and_petrichor



Series: I love you and I like you: A collection of ficlets [3]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-15
Updated: 2015-03-15
Packaged: 2018-03-17 22:44:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3546521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cellardoors_and_petrichor/pseuds/cellardoors_and_petrichor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oliver spends most of his life seeing memories that are most decidedly not his own. But they're not any less important.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through your blue eyes

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Pink on Green: Reloaded](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2541998) by [sssssssim](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sssssssim/pseuds/sssssssim). 



> This is based off a drabble which I highly recommend you read first (see Ch. 60 of Pink on Green: Reloaded). So essentially, what I'm saying is that only a little of this material is mine because I also kind of stole her style, but I hope you enjoy it.

The first time it happened, Oliver was seven. He woke up crying, feeling the loss of someone else’s father leaving. Oliver even snuck out of bed to make sure his own father was in his office.

He forgot about it by morning.

~≡~

The second time it happened, Oliver wasn’t sure what to think. He was in sixth grade, playing basketball with Tommy and a few friends. For a moment, he saw maths notes written in pink ink on a notebook page decorated with doodles.

He shook out of his reverie when Tommy knocked into him. He brushed it off.

~≡~

Oliver was 15 the third time it happened. He was in their private library, trying to find their copy of _The Sun Also Rises_. He thought he dozed off when he saw a small girl's bedroom. Not his sister's room. No, this was some other girl's small room and small pink duvet. He briefly wondered who lived there.

He ignored it.

~≡~

At 17, Oliver saw a patio deck, pink-toenailed feet sinking into grass. It felt like summer and happiness, and he almost forgot he was running from the cops.

He ignored it.

~≡~

At 19, Oliver was driving his new car when he almost crashed. He saw a graduation cap and a congratulatory card with a name scrawled on it: Felicity. As an older woman held out her arms he could almost feel her hugging him.

He ignored it.

~≡~

At 20, Oliver made the mistake of calling out Felicity’s name while in bed with a blonde girl and, a few months later, a red head.

He did his best to ignore it.

~≡~

At 21, he saw more things. The kind of college experience he would never have, and computers. A lot of computers. A small twin bed. He saw a boyfriend, who didn’t quite look at her like he assumed a boyfriend should. Not that he would have known. Classes beyond what he could have ever understood. It’s then he really acknowledged that they weren’t dreams or hallucinations. They were real things, moments, and people that someone was seeing.

A person was doing these things, and Oliver was seeing them through her eyes.

He was losing his sense of control, losing his ability to ignore it.

~≡~

The year Oliver turned 22, the images came even more often. So much so, that he couldn’t ignore them anymore. And he didn’t want to. He had no idea who she was, just a name. He had no idea how to find her. He had no idea what it meant.

During one of the flashes, she tilted her head down, and he saw clearly that she was definitely a woman. He didn’t even try to stop his hand from slipping underneath his boxer shorts.

~≡~

Half way into being 22, Oliver saw something different every day. Sometimes, even twice a day. It was usually pleasant or harmless. Until one day.

He was in the Bahamas when he saw the FBI. A lot of commotion, the boyfriend being restrained. Prison. Then later, the letter explaining the suicide.

That night, he drank himself blind.

~≡~

Only weeks after his trip to the Bahamas, Oliver was shipwrecked.

After his father shot himself, he was left alone at sea. He struggled for what felt like an eternity, and despite his father’s last words, his resolve was crumbling. He didn't think he could do what his father asked. He held the gun to his head.

But then he thought of Felicity and the things she had been through. And he set the gun down. Only then did he realize it didn’t have any bullets anyway.

~≡~

It only grew better after that. Not his life, but the flashes. Oliver still saw something every day, and those few minutes were absolutely wonderful. He's sure they weren't especially different, but they were to him because he was different. To this new him, they meant everything. While the world he was in was hell, she was heaven.

Over the next five years, Oliver saw things most people wouldn’t believe. And when he thought he was losing his mind or his grip on reality, he thought of her. She was the one thing he was sure of.

So he kept on fighting. And surviving.

He knew that he would make it home. He just knew he would. Felicity would help him get there.

~≡~

He sometimes indulged his fantasies. Not his sexual fantasies. No, he thought about finding her. What would she look like? Where would she be? Who would she be? And would it even matter?

He thought about holding her and being held by her. He thought about his dress shirts stained with her lipstick. He thought about eating take-out food with her. He thought it would be nice.

But nobody would believe him. They would all think he lost his mind. They might already think that anyway. And even if he could find her, Felicity wouldn’t believe him in a million years.

He wondered if this connection went both ways. But that seemed even more unlikely.

~≡~

Felicity made him stronger. He knew that from the beginning.

During even the worst times, he felt relief when he saw the shortest of flashes. They helped him and they let him know she was okay.

She was the light that made the dark bearable.

She was the person who soothed his loneliness.

She was the only one he could trust. Sometimes more than he could trust himself.

She was the strength he called upon when he wasn't sure. 

She was who pushed him to be a better person.

Felicity changed Oliver a lot.

~≡~

When Oliver returned to Starling City, he wasn’t as overwhelmed as he should be. He wasn’t anything he was supposed to be. He stood at the window overlooking the city, _his_ city. He should have been thinking about the list but his return to civilization only drew his thoughts closer to Felicity. He wondered where she was. He knew that if he didn’t have a job to do, he would have searched the world for her.

When he saw her wrapped on a couch and watching the news of his return, he wondered if she could be closer than he thought.

~≡~

Oliver felt secure when he kept seeing flashes of Felicity’s life. It was ridiculous in some sense, that he could be so wildly protective of a person he hadn't met. It wasn't so strange in another, though. She helped him hold onto a piece of himself that would have been lost without her. He worried what would happen if he ever had to know a world without her flashes in it.

The first time he walked down the halls of QC, he didn’t spare a look at anyone in his way. He just thought about Felicity, and if maybe he wasn’t so busy, he could find her.

~≡~

When the head of the IT department recommends a certain employee to help him with his computer problem, he freezes. _Felicity Smoak_. It has to be her.

‘Felicity Smoak?’, he calls out in the office. It’s the office he’s been looking for but the woman won’t turn around her chair, and so he tries again.

‘Hi, I’m Oliver Queen.’ He’s met with silence, so he clears he throat and continues. ‘I’m having some trouble with my computer and they told me you were the person to come and see.’

He sets down the laptop, a little harder than necessary, so that maybe she will turn around and he can finally see her face. In all the moments he’s seen, he’s never actually seen her. He’s starting to get frustrated and anxious.

‘I was at my coffee shop, surfing the web, and I spilled a latte on it.’

‘Those look like bullet holes’, she says. His eyes widen, and he continues cautiously.

‘You don’t know that’, Oliver says, slowly. ‘You haven’t turned around and looked at it, yet.’

He hears a bittersweet laugh come from her and when she finally turns around, he’s left breathless. He can finally place a face to her name. And it's a gorgeous face, if only because it belongs to her. She stands up from her chair, running her fingers over the bullet holes.

‘Felicity’, Oliver says her name, breathlessly. She looks at him – no, she _sees_ him - and suddenly he needs her to know how important she is. How important she is _to him_. He doesn't even think about how poorly this could end.

‘This is going to sound crazy’, he says, lowering his voice to a whisper. ‘But you’re the reason I’m alive.’

‘How?’, she whispers, just as lowly.

‘Because all my life, I have been seeing moments of yours. I held on to those when I was gone. And it sounds insane, but-‘

‘It really doesn’t’, Felicity interrupts him, taking a deep breath afterwards. ‘It really doesn’t sound crazy’, she repeats. ‘What does sound crazy is you thinking you can do this without me.’

‘This?’, Oliver frowns.

Felicity points at the laptop. ‘Catching Deadshot, for starters.’

She saw his life too. Oh no, _she saw his life too_. She must have seen every poor judgment call Ollie made; she must have seen every horror he witnessed; and most obviously, she must have seen what his life has been since his return. He breathes deeply and covers her hand with his. To hold her or to hold onto her, he isn't sure. Either way, he's awarded with a smile. She turns her hand and links their fingers together.

It feels right.

‘I’m off at 6.’, she says, cocking an eyebrow. ‘You should pick me up and we should go to dinner, or coffee, or to your secret lair. Cause we should talk. Boooooy, should we talk.’

At this point, he's already memorized the way her eyes light up with her smile. And speaking of that smile, he has been repeatedly drawn to those lips. He kisses her then. Short, and fast, but it's enough to take his own breath away.

‘Okay’, Oliver whispers against her lips before pulling back. ‘Okay.’

Felicity smiles, again, and squeezes his hand. ‘I’ll work on the computer till then.’ 


End file.
